Be still my beating heart: Viagra may help there too
By Sam Lister, Health Correspondent

VIAGRA, the most popular anti-impotence drug, may not only help the sex life, but also stress levels, research suggests.
A US study of the effects of sildenafil citrate, better known by its brand name, Viagra, has shown that it halves stress- related damage to the heart. Scientists at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, found that the drug softened the pounding heartbeat caused by high stress.

Participants in the six-month study were given an injection of dobutamine, an adrenaline-like chemical that induces cardiological stress similar to that triggered by emotion, exercise or diseases such as heart failure.
Half the group were then given Viagra and the rest took a placebo. David Kass, a cardiologist at the university’s medical school, said that Viagra had blunted the heartbeat and diminished the excess amount of blood and force used to pump the heart.

“Sildenafil effectively puts a ‘brake’ on chemical stimulation of the heart,” Professor Kass said. In the tests, conducted on 35 men and women, Viagra slowed the increase in the strength of heart contractions from 150 per cent to about 75 per cent.